Lip Sync Evaluation

What did you do to prepare?

We wanted to make our videos look really good and fun to watch, so to prepare, we learnt the words to Taylor Swift's shake it off, and we also brought in lots of different costumes and props so that it would be fun to both film and watch our videos. We brought in things such as hats, glasses and feather boas. 

What did you do in the studio?

In the studio, we set up 3 different cameras using different set. The first set/background was a green screen, the second was a sofa and the third was a background that looked like a stone wall(where the tracking camera was set up). There was three different groups within my class for filming, so each group started on a different set, we played the song out loud and began to film those from the group that had volunteered to be in the video, we took several takes to make sure we had enough footage when it come to editing, the people in the groups then swapped round so we all had a turn infant and behind the camera, we then repeated this process on the other sets. My favourite set to film was the stone wall background as there was a tracking camera so one person sat down and filmed the people behind the camera whilst another person pushes it also the track.  

What did you learn?

I had never filmed a music video before and I had never used the tracking camera, so It was fun to learn about how that worked, (as explained above). I also learned it is a lot harder to edit a music video and you need to get the words to match the lyrics in the song, which is quite hard to do because if it is a little bit off, it looks so bad and silly as it doesn't make sense. 

What did you do in suite, what steps did you take to cut the video?

In the edit suite, we watched through all the footage and picked the good from the not so good/unusable footage. We then had all the good footage in a bin, from which we dragged to the timeline and for each clip we had to listen for the high pitched noise that happened just before the first beat. We would have to pause footage and then using the arrow keys slowly go through it to find the moment just before the beat to make sure that the song and video were in sync. We repeated this for all the clips. Next we  began cutting the clips and re arranging them on the timeline to create the final video.

What did you learn about editing a music video?

It is much harder to edit a music video as I mentioned above, than it was editing our thrillers for example because it is a completely different process, the words and song have to match up. At the start of all our clips, we had a really loud beep that would play just before the song started, so we alined the clips with the song, by carefully and slowly going through the clip until we found the moment after the beep but just before the beat to make sure that the song and the persons mouth were in sync.I found it much harder than what it looked. Also I think you need to think more about where you cut the video as it could look silly at times depending what is going on in the song and if its with the beat etc. 

Did you make any mistakes on the day? How could you shoot or cut the video more effectively next time?

I think the most common mistake we made was we kept forgetting to sing, which made it 100x harder when it come to the editing as we didn't have a clue if the song and video were actually in sync, and people were just guessing the lyrics, which made it obviously harder as we were confused trying to figure out what lyric it was actually meant to be and then when we finally did get it right, it looked wrong as their mouths didn't match the words, this obviously wasted a lot of time when in the editing suite, which caused us to rush the editing making it not as good as it could have been. In a few shots we also forgot to focus and get the exposure right on the camera before we began filming, so then when cutting between shots, it looked funny as one shot it would be in focus and the exposure was right and then it would cut back to a shot out of focus with high exposure. Also I think in the editing suite, we wasted a lot of time re watching footage and laughing at the footage that had gone wrong and because my group found it a bit tricky syncing the video and song, we were pushed for time. So for next time, I would say, always make sure the camera is set up correctly and when it comes to editing, just jump straight in and don't waste time 'umming' and 'ahhing' about footage.

Watch our video below: